The Relationship Between Gender, Posttraumatic Stress Disorder from Past Trauma, Alexithymia and...
Chen, Zhuo; Chung, Man
2016-02-13 00:00:00
This study focused on a group of Chinese adolescents and examined whether the degree of alexithymia would mediate the effect of PTSD from past trauma onto psychiatric co-morbidities and whether gender differences would moderate the mediational effects of alexithymia. Three hundred and twenty-six adolescents were recruited from two schools and completed the Posttraumatic Stress Diagnostic Scale, General Health Questionnaire-28 and Toronto Alexithymia Scale-20. The results showed that 54 % had no trauma in their lives; 10, 21 and 15 % met the criteria for full, partial and no-PTSD respectively. After adjusting the number of traumatic events, difficulty identifying feelings mediated the path between PTSD from past trauma and psychiatric co-morbidity. Gender moderated the mediational effect of difficulty identifying feelings. To conclude, adolescents can develop PTSD symptoms and psychiatric co-morbidity following exposure to a traumatic event. For both males and females, difficulty getting in touch with feelings can influence the impact of PTSD onto psychiatric co-morbidity.
http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.pngPsychiatric QuarterlySpringer Journalshttp://www.deepdyve.com/lp/springer-journals/the-relationship-between-gender-posttraumatic-stress-disorder-from-4b0FiM00ER

Abstract

This study focused on a group of Chinese adolescents and examined whether the degree of alexithymia would mediate the effect of PTSD from past trauma onto psychiatric co-morbidities and whether gender differences would moderate the mediational effects of alexithymia. Three hundred and twenty-six adolescents were recruited from two schools and completed the Posttraumatic Stress Diagnostic Scale, General Health Questionnaire-28 and Toronto Alexithymia Scale-20. The results showed that 54 % had no trauma in their lives; 10, 21 and 15 % met the criteria for full, partial and no-PTSD respectively. After adjusting the number of traumatic events, difficulty identifying feelings mediated the path between PTSD from past trauma and psychiatric co-morbidity. Gender moderated the mediational effect of difficulty identifying feelings. To conclude, adolescents can develop PTSD symptoms and psychiatric co-morbidity following exposure to a traumatic event. For both males and females, difficulty getting in touch with feelings can influence the impact of PTSD onto psychiatric co-morbidity.